Chess
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Your support makes all the difference.OF THE nearly 50 tournament games he has played this year, Garry Kasparov has lost just one, at Wijk aan Zee, to Bosnian Ivan Sokolov.
Sokolov, the runaway winner of last New Year's Hastings tournament, was originally from Sarajevo but like his countryman Predrag Nikolic moved to Holland during the Bosnia war and has stayed there.
Normally a scourge of all the Dutch players apart from the top three - Timman, Piket and Van Wely - Sokolov unexpectedly had a nightmare of a tournament at the Dutch Championship in June, only fighting his way back to 50 per cent at the end.
Now, though, he has redeemed himself with a fine victory in the Lost Boys tournament in Amsterdam. Running from August 13 to 20, this eight- player all-play-all averaged 2,600 (Category 14). Sokolov scored an unbeaten 5/7 and was followed by Nikolic and Timman on 4.5, Piket and Reinderman 3.5, Avrukh (Israel) 3, and Ljubojevic (Yugoslavia) and Van der Sterren 2.
Sokolov's last two wins (against Avrukh and Piket) were fine but lengthy technical performances, so here instead is his first-round "hack" against Dimitri Reinderman.
In an old-fashioned "Bishop's Gambit" Sokolov played the unusual 3 ...Ne7 - a move introduced by the first "official" World Champion Wilhem Steinitz against David Janowsky in Vienna in 1898, four years after Steinitz's reign (1886-94) was ended by Emanuel Lasker.
5 Qh5 is also highly unusual - indeed possibly a "novelty" though it has been played immediately after 3 ...Ne7. White didn't accomplish much and in the diagram he presumably felt that, in order to regain the pawn, he had to allow ...Nb4xd3 deadening his position. If 10 a3 Nc7 11 Ne2 Ne6 firmly defends f4 pawn: but 10 Bxa6 looks like a lesser evil.
Sokolov built up a huge attack while Reinderman had no play. If 22 hxg4 Rxg4! when the rook can't be taken since the h5 knight would hang. At the end if 31 Kf2 Qxf7+ or 31 Kh2 Rg2+ 32 Kh1 Qh3 mate.
Dimitri Reinderman v Ivan Sokolov
Lost Boys, Amsterdam 1999 (Round 1) King's Gambit
1 e4 e5
2 f4 exf4
3 Bc4 Ne7
4 Nc3 c6
5 Qh5 Ng6
6 Nf3 Be7
7 d4 d6
8 e5 d5
9 Bd3 Na6
(see diagram)
10 Ne2 Nb4
11 0-0 Nxd3
12 cxd3 h6
13 Bxf4 Be6
14 Be3 Qd7
15 h3 0-0-0
16 Rf2 Rdg8
17 Nh2 Nh4
18 Ng3 g6
19 Qe2 g5
20 Raf1 h5
21 Nxh5 g4
22 Nf6 Bxf6
23 Rxf6 gxh3
24 g4 Bxg4
25 Nxg4
Rxg4+
26 Kh1 Rg2
27 Qd1 h2
28 Rxf7 Rg1+
29 Bxg1
hxg1Q+
30 Kxg1 Rg8+ 0-1
g,dxa, b
nh, chnh
f,h, ,f,
, ,hN ,S
, N n ,
, VD,F,
HNH, ,HN
B C Z ,G
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